Beloved Singaporean film director Jack Neo was dubbed “Singapore’s Tiger Woods” this week after his girlfriend of two years–a 22-year-old model/actress that had played bit parts in some of his films–confronted his wife and spilled her story to tabloids. The mistress, Wendy Chong, is just five years younger than Neo’s marriage of 27 years.

For whatever reason, Neo’s wife, Irene, has decided to stay with her husband. She joined him at a press conference and tearfully made a statement about her decision, begging for forgiveness, support, and the public’s blessing. Neo had already stated, “Please give us a second chance.”

As she exited the room, Irene Neo collapsed in sobs and had to be carried out.

A young Asian woman was killed almost three weeks ago in September, and still no one seems to know who she was. I’m not, of course, talking about Yale graduate student Annie Le.

Her name was Lee, one letter removed from “Le,” Felicia Lee, to be exact. Professionally, the Singapore-born, Australia-raised 31 year-old went by Felicia Tang, and in addition to having bit parts in Rush Hour 2 and The Fast and the Furious, she had appeared on Playboy TV and in adult films like Hotel Decadence and Asian Fever. In 2003, she was in an online erotic video with Tila Tequila where they fondled each other in a pool. In some reports, she has been described as a “porn star,” but her career in adult entertainment does not appear to have been that extensive. Most recently, it was reported that Lee was working towards getting her real estate license.

As much as the details of Lee’s life and death, true or inflated, would seem sensational enough (porn, Hollywood, torture, a pretty victim) for widespread media coverage, unlike Annie Le’s murder, Lee’s has largely failed to capture the public’s imagination. In the week following her murder, only a scattering of newspapers and media outlets had actually bothered to report it. The San Gabriel Valley Tribune wrote a story about it on September 15 (Monrovia is in the SGV). The San Jose Mercury Newsposted one on the 16th. The LA Times Local section penned a blog post on the 17th. The closest thing to a national media outlet to report on Lee’s death in that first week was CBS News’ Crimesider blog, described as “The True Crime Destination from the Producers of 48 Hours Mystery,” which published a story on September 18 entitled “The Preacher and the Porn Star, the Tragic Story of Felicia Tang Lee (Photos).” Within that same timeframe, several Chinese-language newspapers also picked up the story.

To understand why Felicia Lee’s murder has had less media “value” than Annie Le’s, I re-read Joan Didion’s “Sentimental Journeys,” from her 1992 collection Ask Henry, in which she examined the way the media covers crime vis-a-vis the Central Park Jogger case. In the essay, Didion writes that the “preferred tabloid (crime) victim” is someone who’s “presented as fate’s random choice,” “attended an expensive school” and/or “been employed in a glamour industry.” Annie Le–high school valedictorian, Yale graduate student, fiancee of her college sweetheart–certainly fit that bill. Felicia Lee–topless model, adult film actress, girlfriend to the man who allegedly murdered her, whom she met around the Las Vegas MGM Grand swimming pool in April–did not.

To that point, it was a full two weeks after Lee’s murder, on September 25, before the Associated Press finally got around to reporting it. By that time, about 600 articles could be found online about her death. Contrast that with the tens of thousands of stories about Annie Le, whose body was found two days after Lee’s.

Shortly thereafter, the blogosphere got around to reporting it, too. But only to an extent. The blog posts that have emerged haven’t focused on Lee so much as they have on her boyfriend and alleged killer, Randone. The fact that he was on a reality TV show–albeit 9 years ago–has given the story legs. The fact that another reality TV contestant, Ryan Jenkins, killed his lover recently, has made the story run. And since two murders with perceived similar circumstances–however tenuous–were committed within a month of one another, the story’s suddenly become “news,” in the way that Didion described it, in that it now offers “however erroneously, a story, a lesson, a high concept.”

“So, the lesson here: America’s popular culture, not the four horsemen, will spark the apocalypse. Also, if you meet someone who’s been on a reality star, run, because they will kill you.”

Let’s re-phrase. So, the lesson here: the story of Felicia Lee’s murder isn’t about Felicia Lee at all. It doesn’t matter if she was a “porn star” or “a human being, a daughter, a sister, a friend to many who continue to love and honor her,” as the Lee family described her in a statement to the LA Times. (My god, to have to remind the world that your murdered loved one was a “human being.”) She isn’t, as it turns out, the story, the lesson, or the high concept. What an odd thing it is, to have to be cut out of your own narrative, in order for it to be told.

Happy Birthday to former Porn Superstar Kobe Tai! Oh sure, some of you are more familiar with her as the stripper killed on the clothes hook in Very Bad Things, or from her singing stint on Marilyn Manson’s Mechanical Animals, but to us, she will always be the legendary Porn Superstar Kobe Tai!

Tai turns 37 today, and even though we don’t have a picture of her at her birthday party, we’re pretty sure she looks rather good after 7 years of very hard work.

Known for: At 74, being the oldest cock on the adult film block. A former travel agent, Tokuda got into the jizz bizz fourteen years ago because he liked watching porn but was too embarrassed to go to the video store in order to get his rocks off, so he wound up going to the production company that made the films he liked instead and befriending a director who convinced him to turn pro. And thus, a star–in equal parts awe-inspiring and eww-inducing–was born.

Click here for NSFW stills from Tokuda’s film, Tit-lover Old Man Kameichi and His Horny Pranks.

Governor Palin stages a totally meaningless photo-op/converses with an intellectual equal, finally/takes the first baby step toward being able to find Pakistan on a map meets with Pakistan Prez Asif Ali Zardari on Wednesday

The life of Annabel Chong, the Singaporean porn star/self-anointed feminist who performed 251 sex acts on 70 dudes in 10 hours, has been turned into “251,” a play that is currently up in her native country.

I have to admit, I’m intrigued by Miz Chong, who has apparently retired from the biz and is now a “web designer and programmer,” according to Wikipedia. How did she make the transition? Is her feminist take on porn and gangbanging for real? Did she actually read Michel Foucault?

But then I look at the poster for the play, and I have only one question: